In April 2014, prominent Quebec City lawyer Lu Chan Khuong was detained after she walked out of a department store without paying for two pairs of jeans. She avoided trial and publicity by accepting the Crowns suggestion the case be dealt with non-judicially as part of a program to avoid cluttering up the courts with minor offences. That, she hoped, was that. In May she was elected president of the provincial law society, the Barreau du Québec. I will be the spokesperson for justice, she declared when she took office last month. But after a newspaper reported her brush with...

Michael Sam's CFL career has hit a snag. The Alouettes released a statement regarding Sam Friday evening: "The Montreal Alouettes organization would like to clarify the situation surrounding international defensive end Michael Sam. Friday morning, Michael asked the team a special permission to leave training camp and return home for personal reasons. "With all due respect for Michael Sam, the nature of this decision will remain confidential. "The Montreal Alouettes fully respect Michael Sam's decision and rally around him to offer him all time and support needed. The team has left the door open and Michael is welcome to come...

What started as a row over lemonade could end up with international airlines being forced to employ French speakers on all flights that serve Canada, a country where French and English are classed as official languages. An MP in Canada, Stephane Dion, has lodged a bill with parliament that if passed would oblige all flights to and from Canada to have a French speaker on board and for all passenger announcements to be made in both English and French. The inspiration for his bill lies in an argument over a lemonade on an AirCanada flight between Toronto and North Carolina...

The Supreme Court has ruled the federal government is allowed to destroy the long-gun registry data pertaining to Quebec, so the province is going to spend tens of millions of dollars to create its own from scratch. Quebec Public Security Minister Lise Theriault reacted with dismay on Friday to the Supreme Court's decision that the federal government can flush the data it has on long gun owners in the province. She says Quebec had no choice but to create its own database to keep track of weapons.

Canadian geologists say they can shed light on how a vast lake, trapped under the ice sheet that once smothered much of North America, drained into the sea, an event that cooled Earth's climate for hundreds of years. During the last ice age, the Laurentide Ice Sheet once covered most of Canada and parts of the northern United States with a frozen crust that in some places was three kilometres (two miles) thick. As the temperature gradually rose some 10,000 years ago, the ice receded, gouging out the hollows that would be called the Great Lakes. Beneath the ice's thinning...

Thatâs all Reuters has right now, apart from his name: Michael Zehaf-Bibeau. One reporter notes, though, that that name appears several times in Montrealâs court database on drug charges. Martin Couture-Rouleau, the suspect in the other recent attack on Canadian soldiers and a convert to Islam himself, also lived in Quebec. Might be just a coincidence but the first thing police will be investigating is whether these two knew each other. The timing of the attacks suggests that there was some copycatting happening at least.Another interesting detail: A Twitter account linked to ISIS apparently tweeted a photo this afternoon...

Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard says Scotland's referendum was an example of the same kind of "healthy" tension that exists in Quebec's democracy, but the comparisons stop there, as federal politicians from John Baird to Stéphane Dion welcomed the defeat of Scottish independence. "It is an example of a healthy state of tension in sub-national states in countries like U.K. or Canada between a strong feeling of identity, which I think Scots and Quebecers have in common, and at the same time the desire to belong to a larger political organization, the U.K. or Canada," Couillard said Friday. "All comparisons after...

Though Canada's political centre of gravity of gravity has shifted westward in recent times - the country's conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper, though Toronto-born, represents a constituency in resource-rich Alberta - this trend has not sparked a separatist revival. Paradoxically, the two referenda were held when two pro-Canada Quebecers, Pierre Trudeau and Jean Chretien, were Prime Minister. A key difference between Scotland and Quebec is the simplicity of the six-word question posed in the referendum: "Should Scotland be an independent country?" In 1995, Quebecers faced a 43-word question that many voters found incomprehensible. In 1980, it ran to a riddle-like...

Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard took advantage of a public appearance with Prime Minister Stephen Harper to repeat his wish for the province to sign the Constitution. Couillard said he wants Quebec to sign on by 2017, the 150th anniversary of Confederation. The premier made the comments Saturday during a Quebec City speech, at an event commemorating the 200th anniversary of the birth of Sir George-Etienne Cartier, a French-Canadian statesman viewed as one of the Fathers of Confederation. Cartiers vision for a united Canada that incorporates a strong Quebec identity could serve as an inspiration in future talks, Couillard said

GATINEAU  A former physical education teacher from Quebec has been sentenced to 20 months in jail for carrying on a two-year sexual relationship with a high school student. Despite her pleas in Gatineau court Friday to serve her sentence in the community, Tania Pontbriand received an 18-month sentence for two counts of sexual exploitation and a 20-month sentence for one count of sexual assault. She will serve the sentences concurrently. She was also sentenced to two years probation following her jail term. Pontbriand was convicted of the three offences in January for having a sexual relationship with her student...

...The bull-by-the-horns approach taken by Quebecs Philippe Couillard. Less than two months after his April election as Premier, his government tabled legislation to tackle the almost $4-billion deficit facing municipal sector pension plans. This means taking on the powerful police and firefighter unions, which have staged loud protests and, bizarrely, worn skirts to work to show their defiance. But while hes open to amending the bill, on which the government will hold hearings this week, the Premier insists the objective of 50-50 cost-sharing between employees and employers is non-negotiable. Active employees will be required to bear half the cost of...

I shall rend the heavens soon in a new way for all the Earth is about to witness and taste of My glory as I (( ( Roar ) )) out salvation over the children of My creation and Now in this Valley of Decisions I shall rise up the mountains that choose Me and have chosen Me . So watch and see for The Latter Rain is about to flourish My Lilies of The Valley I AM about to dress in My Glory Isaiah 64:1-4 64 Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains...

More than 15 wasps stung Lucie Roussel's legs near her Quebec home. She became La Prairie's mayor in 2005 and recently won reelection to a third term. ... Paramedics gave her an EpiPen to treat an allergic reaction, but it didn't help, La Prairie spokeswoman Chantal Charron said. The 51-year-old mayor, who was apparently not allergic to bees, died at a nearby hospital from multiple stings and shock ... She leaves behind two teenage children  her daughter, Constance, and her son, Antonin. Her husband died several years ago from a heart attack

While the federal government ordered railroads a month ago to give states details about shipments of volatile crude oil from North Dakotas Bakken shale region, New York State officials havent decided whether to share that information with the public. The Associated Press and eight environmental groups filed Freedom of Information Law requests with the state Office of Emergency Management this week, arguing that its in the public interest for communities to know more about the shipments in light of at least eight major accidents during the last year, including one that killed 47 people in Quebec a year ago. The...

Quebec has adopted a right to-die bill in what is the first legislation of its kind in Canada. The federal Canadian government, however, has said it could challenge its legality. Bill 52 carried the day by a 94-22 majority. The legislation is officially dubbed an act respecting end-of-life care.

Enlarge ImageThe vault. The sediments at the bottom of the lake in Northen Quebec's Pingualuit Crater hold unmatched clues to North America's climate record.Credit: Robert Fréchette / ARK; (inset) University of Arkansas SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA--A million years ago, a large meteorite smashed into what is now northern Quebec and created a crater that may become an unprecedented repository of data with which to study long-term climate change, researchers reported here this week at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union. Canada and the northern United States are dotted with tens of thousands of lakes, most of them formed by...

TORONTO  The RCMP has conducted searches in Ontario and Quebec as part of an investigation into a Muslim relief organization that federal auditors accuse of sending almost $15-million to the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas. Integrated National Security Enforcement Teams raided the head office of the International Relief Fund for the Afflicted and Needy  Canada in Mississauga, Ont. on Monday, as well as a private residence in Montreal. An extensive amount of documentary evidence along with stored media, money and other records were seized, the RCMP said in a statement issued shortly after the government announced the former charity...

The explosion destroyed six city blocks. Several of the 30 burning buildings were incinerated. Many ruptured tanker cars were bunched together like folds in an accordion. Still others, intact, could detonate at any second, and Pellerin could tell that much of the 1.5 million gallons of spilled oil had ignited and poured through the small Quebec town like lava. Canadian firefighters told Pellerin that they actually saw people step out of their homes and be vaporized by the [burning] oil, Pellerin told the U.S. Senate Transportation Appropriations Subcommittee in Washington on Wednesday

Devil And The Deep Blue "C" It is true what they say; sometimes you have to choose the lesser of two evils. And it takes a whole hell of a lot for me to cheer for corrupt and weak-willed Liberals. But tonight, after Pauline Marois got her derriere kicked, she can console herself with the notion that she is the only person thus far to make Liberals, Quebec Liberals, who don't deserve to have been returned to office but still were, look like the better option as far as I'm concerned. I want all of the self-professed oppression fighters to...

Quebec's Liberal Party is set to form a majority provincial government, routing a bid by Quebec's main separatist party for their own majority. Liberals have won 41% of the vote, with nearly all ballots counted. Parti Quebecois (PQ) leader Pauline Marois has resigned in response to the crushing defeat, with her party only obtaining 25%. She dissolved the PQ-led minority government last month, after coalition partners blocked the party's agenda. Liberal leader Philippe Couillard will now become the province's premier. The election centred on PQ's controversial Charter of Values, which would ban public employees from wearing religious items, and a...

KIEV - The man Russian President Vladimir Putin has cast as one of Europe's potential new Adolf Hitlers is a little late for coffee this Saturday morning. Igor Mazur, or Topoyla (Poplar) as he's known because he's 6'7" is the leader of the Ukranian Right Sector at Maidan, Kiev's Independence Square. The Right Sector are the radical nationalists of this Ukranian Revolution. There are others: the right-wing Svoboda (Freedom) Party, for one, which has an actual political following, 12 percent of the vote in the last elections. It used to identify itself as a national socialist movement, just like the...

As the U.S. Senate took up a bill to provide financial aid to Ukraine, U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, R-Texas, rose to object to an IMF bailout Majority Leader Harry Reid attached to the legislation. In the process he blasted Reid for repeatedly demonizing the billionaire Koch brothers - Reid tried to blame the Koch brothers for halting progress on the Ukraine bill. "I'm beginning to think [the Koch brothers] are a character almost out of Dr. Seuss in the majority leader's mind, they are the grinch who stole Christmas in his telling," Cruz said. Cruz accused Reid of "using his...

SHERBROOKE, Que.  Pulling his ex-girlfriend's body from the rubble in Lac-Megantic, Que., led a young fireman to commit suicide, a coroner has ruled. The report, issued this week, follows widespread warnings about the toll that Canada's deadliest railway explosion has taken on support staff. The 25-year-old firefighter, whose name was redacted from the report, was one of the first responders to the train derailment and explosion on July 6. Forty-seven people died in the town near Quebec's border with Maine. Coroner Robert Giguere's report said the young man had only begun working as an apprentice firefighter 10 days earlier....

It's the middle of winter, so backyard rinks are in full bloom. Many you see are of the no frills variety -- some wood acting as the boards and a fresh sheet of ice with hockey equipment littered on top. But for Justin Lachapelle, a resident of St-Lazare, Quebec, he's taken his love for the Montreal Canadiens and his ability to build a backyard rink to an entirely different level. Not only does his 64-by-32 rink have re-used boards from a local rink, painted lines and face-off circles to make it look like Bell Centre, there's also a dressing room...

The Québec government moved forward Thursday with a proposed law that would ban public employees from wearing overt religious symbols, setting the stage for a showdown over the place of religion in the province. Québec Premier Pauline Marois said the law aims to preserve the provinces fundamental values, including the equality of men and women and the separation of church and state. Her separatist Parti Québécois on Thursday introduced its Charter of Values in the provinces legislature. The law would forbid government employees from wearing Muslim headscarves, Jewish kippas, Sikh turbans and larger-than-average crucifixes. It would also prohibit citizens...

Here are some links about the battle between LifeSiteNews.com and Canadian Priest Father Raymond Gravel: Update on Fr. Gravel Lawsuit against LifeSiteNewsJohn-Henry Westen letter to National Post re: Gravel lawsuit articleFr. Raymond Gravel diagnosed with terminal cancer: launched lawsuit against LifeSiteNewsLifeSiteNews is being sued for $500,000 - this could shut us down!A key argument in this lawsuit is the following: [From the link above, quote from LifeSiteNews] Even though LifeSiteNews reports have overwhelmingly reported on what Fr. Gravel himself has publicly said, he is suing us for libel. Among other things, he argues that he isnt pro-abortion, but he has...

The Quebec National Assembly voted today on Bill 52 (An Act respecting end-of-life care) that takes the Canadian province once step closer to legalizing euthanasia.The vote comes as an opinion poll indicates most Quebec residents do not favor the billÂs provisions for Âmedical aid in dying.ÂIn an online survey of almost 500 residents conducted October 23-28 by Abingdon Research, 47% said Bill 52 requires further study, while another 14% expressed opposition. Only a minority Â 35% Â were in favour of the bill.Natalie Sonnen, executive director of LifeCanada, said the poll also highlighted problems with the billâs use of the...

Montreal  The Quebec college of physicians has issued a warning to doctors to stop performing virginity tests, a practice linked to bridal purity and family honour. Gynecological exams for virginity certificates contravene the professions code of ethics on several grounds, including breaching patient confidentiality, said Charles Bernard, president of the Collège des médecins, in an interview. The practise is outrageous, repugnant, irrelevant and unacceptable, he said. Imagine a doctor who does a gynecological examination with the sole purpose of it goes beyond the imagination. And its degrading to women, Dr. Bernard said. The College was responding to a...

Theres a heated debate in Canada over Québecs proposal to ban symbols of religious faith such as Jewish skullcaps, Sikh turbans, Muslim head scarves and large crucifixes from public work places. The proposed ban is part of what the Québec government calls its charter of values. It has divided the province of 8.1 million and mobilized the opposition.

Quebecs separatist government is betting on broad popular support with a proposal that prohibits public workers from wearing headscarves, skullcaps and other religious symbols, yet it is dividing the movement that advocates independence from Canada. The proposal, unveiled by the ruling Parti Quebecois last week, plays with the explosive issue of minority rights in a part of Canada, a country that prides itself as being a tapestry of immigrants rather than a U.S.-style melting pot. The governments proposed Charter of Quebec Values would ban teachers, doctors and other public workers from wearing highly visible religious symbols, including yarmulkes, headscarves and...

OTTAWA -- A 16-year-old girl who claims she was forced into prostitution said she was plied with Goldschlager and beer to the point just sitting on the couch became troublesome. "I think I fell off the couch," the teen told detectives a month after the traumatic June 2012 night. Another girl took her to the bathroom, and darkness engulfed her. When she awoke, she was naked and lying in a bathtub. She wasn't alone. The girl who had invited her over and led her to the bathroom was sitting on the toilet, taking photos. "Do you want to make money?"...

A move by Quebecs ruling Parti Québécois to ban public workers in the province from wearing ostentatious symbols has drawn fire from other Canadian leaders, and even created an internal division within the group. The so-called Charter of Quebec Values forbids state employees from wearing large Christian crosses, Jewish skullcaps or Muslim headscarves to work.

As two dramas about the conflict vie for attention at TIFF, normally outspoken actors and ï¬lmmakers on hand for the fest remain conspicuously mum on the subject. The conflict in Syria and the increasing likelihood of Western involvement is occupying hearts and minds at this yearÂs festival. Still, when it comes to Hollywood voices publicly weighing in on the debate over U.S. intervention in the territory, the silence has been deafening. A number of high-profile Hollywood names on hand for the festival, whoÂve been outspoken in the past on U.S. military intervention, have been uncharacteristically quiet on the issue. THR...

The Quebec province in Canada has adopted a new Charter of Quebec Values, prohibiting skullcaps and other religious garments to be worn during public service. According to the charter, employees in the public service system -including doctors, nurses, teachers, and government officials  will not be allowed to wear any religious symbols or garments while working, including a Star of David, cross, kippot, burqa or turban. According to Ynet, leaders in the Jewish community, including Lawyer and Political advisor Eric Maldoff who lead the delegation and Jewish Federation president David Cape, met with Bernard Dranville, the Canadian minister responsible for...

A meteor or comet impact near Quebec heaved a rain of hot melted rock along North America's Atlantic Coast about 12,900 years ago, a new study claims. Scientists have traced the geochemical signature of the BB-sized spherules that rained down back to their source, the 1.5-billion-year-old Quebecia terrane in northeastern Canada near the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. At the time of the impact, the region was covered by a continental ice sheet, like Antarctica and Greenland are today. "We have provided evidence for an impact on top of the ice sheet," said study co-author Mukul Sharma, a geochemist at Dartmouth...

A meteor or comet impact near Quebec heaved a rain of hot melted rock along North America's Atlantic Coast about 12,900 years ago, a new study claims. Scientists have traced the geochemical signature of the BB-sized spherules that rained down back to their source, the 1.5-billion-year-old Quebecia terrane in northeastern Canada near the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. At the time of the impact, the region was covered by a continental ice sheet, like Antarctica and Greenland are today. Around this time, a global cooling began and the big animals in North America all vanished. Their human hunters, the Clovis people,...

American greenies imagine they can save the planet by stopping construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, but in the real world they will expose Mother Gaia (and human beings) to greater harm by forcing more oil to be transported by rail. Pipelines are far safer than rail transportation, as we are reminded by the horror that engulfed much of the town of Lac-Megantic, Quebec in flames. Thirteen people are known dead, but as many as 50 are missing, while charred bodies still are being pulled from the ruins. This reality should haunt the nightmares of greenies, people generally given to...

CNN) -- The chairman of the company whose driverless train barreled into the small Quebec town of Lac-Megantic and unleashed a deadly inferno told a Montreal newspaper he believes it had been tampered with. "We have evidence of this," Ed Burkhardt said in an interview published by the Montreal Gazette. "But this is an item that needs further investigation. We need to talk to some people we believe to have knowledge of this." The company did not immediately return phone calls from CNN about the report. Burkhardt is the chief executive officer and president of Rail World, the parent company...

LAC-MÉGANTIC, Que.  As the confirmed death toll climbed here Monday, the head of the company whose runaway train was at the centre of this tragedy says he is certain a locomotive was tampered with. We have evidence of this, said Ed Burkhardt, chairman of The Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway. But this is an item that needs further investigation. We need to talk to some people we believe have knowledge of this. ... The ensuing crash and explosions destroyed a stunning swath of the downtown and are now being blamed for 13 confirmed deaths. With the number of people...

LAC-MEGANTIC, Que.  About 40 people are considered missing after the spectacular blaze and explosions that razed much of Lac-Megantic, increasing the likelihood that the number of fatalities could soar from the current official death toll of five. I can tell you that we have met a lot of people .and what I can tell you is that about 40 people are considered missing, Quebec provincial police Lt. Michel Brunet told a news conference. We have to be careful with that number because it could go up or down. It is the first time police have gone public with an estimate...

A train carrying crude oil derailed in the town of Lac-Megantic, Que., early Saturday morning, sending giant flames into the air and prompting a mass evacuation. At least 1,000 residents have been evacuated from their homes in Lac-Megantic, which is located about 250 kilometres east of Montreal. A number of the trains 73 cars exploded, causing a fire that spread to several of buildings in the community.

Best Buy's latest promotion has provoked an angry response on social media, but the company is defending its decision to recognize what it calls the "Moving Day holiday" in Quebec. Many people have been surprised to see a flyer promoting a "Moving Day Sale" in Quebec on July 1. The same promotion is being advertised in the rest of the country as a "Canada Day Sale."

The Canadian Soccer Association says it has suspended a provincial association over its refusal to let turban-wearing children play. Quebecs federation says its concerned about safety and points out that the rules of the world governing body, FIFA, dont specifically allow turbans. Critics of the Quebec decision point out that FIFAs rules dont explicitly ban turbans, either.

SAINT-JEROME, QC - A school board north of Montreal has launched an internal investigation after school staff strip searched 28 high school students to find a cellphone during a year-end exam. The board admits that staff at Cap-Jeunesse high school in Saint-Jerome, QC, "lacked judgment" for asking 28 Grade 10 students to remove their clothes when a phone went missing last week. The students were ordered to put their phones on a teacher's desk to prevent cheating during a math exam but one phone was unaccounted for, prompting teachers to order the strip search. "They put us in a small...

Chiheb Esseghaier, the younger of two men charged in the al Qaeda train plot, is a Tunisian-born PhD student at a Université du Québec nanotechnology lab who was threatened with expulsion for his disruptive behaviour and strict religious views that alienated his colleagues.

Canadian authorities announced Monday they have broken up an Al Qaeda-linked terror plot to attack a passenger train as it crossed over a bridge in the Toronto area. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said Monday that two suspects have been arrested on terrorism charges. Chiheb Esseghaier and Raed Jaser, who live in greater Montreal and Toronto -- were conspiring to carry out an Al Qaeda-supported attack against Via Rail, but posed no immediate threat to the public. "It was definitely in the planning stage but not imminent," RCMP chief superintendent Jennifer Strachan told reporters at a news conference. Read more:...

Federally-mandated theft has been around as long as Canada has been a nation. Various forms of Equalization policies have littered our history, with only the details of source, recipient, and excuse changing. Always sold in the wrappings of patriotism of helping those provinces suffering economically (and in our early days, possibly justifiable under the circumstances), the system has now become little more than helping those provinces which refuse to help themselves. Thanks to Pierre Trudeaus 1982 Canada Act which puts Equalization in our Constitution, it is probably here to stay. So is it working? Lets choose a random have-not beneficiary...

Two men are dead after a shooting at a daycare in Gatineau, Que., that could be related to the recent breakup of a relationship, according to Gatineau's chief of police. Daycare staff at 225 and 229 Gamelin St. called 911 at 10:27 a.m. ET Friday about a man who was threatening people, according to Chief Mario Harel, who spoke at a 2 p.m. news conference.

News 1130 Vancouver ^ | March 14, 2013 | The Canadian Press and By Nelson Wyatt and Alexandre Robillard, The Canadian Press

Convicted terrorist Paul Rose, who died Thursday of a stroke, is best known as an architect of the 1970 October Crisis, which saw political kidnappings and murder and troops flooding into Quebec. Now a member of the provincial legislature wants to honour him.